When Hair Is More Than Hair

Last Thursday, the teachers and students of Willard Elementary School cut off their hair for Locks of Love, a great nonprofit that takes donated hair—10 inches at a time—and makes wigs for children suffering from medical hair loss. The mission: “return a sense of self, confidence and normalcy to children suffering from hair loss by utilizing donated ponytails to provide the highest quality hair prosthetics to financially disadvantaged children.”

Photographer and Hometown reader Rebecca Little has some excellent photos of the proceedings on her website, including the one at right. If you have hair to spare, take a lesson from the generous students of Willard, and consider donating it—you can really make a difference in a child’s life. You won’t miss it much. I didn’t, anyway.

I remember the Ziploc bag. We have pictures of it tucked away somewhere, laying in state on the piano. In it, a thick cord of blonde hair, or maybe someone’s gerbil. It was traumatic: my first haircut in four years (and an unfortunate one at that—like Johnny Depp’s bowl cut in The Chocolate Factory). We kept the bag around for a few days, first out of a brief sense of mourning, and then because it was fun to show visitors. But when it came time to mail it in, I was ready. After all, it wasn’t my hair anymore.